North Durham apartments purchased for $11.8M

Pictured is the entry sign to Willowdaile Apartments off Guess Road. Ginkgo Residential — a Charlotte firm that manages properties in North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia — has purchased the complex for $11.8 million. ctoth@heraldsun.comCasey Toth

Pictured is the entry sign to Willowdaile Apartments off Guess Road. Ginkgo Residential — a Charlotte firm that manages properties in North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia — has purchased the complex for $11.8 million. ctoth@heraldsun.comCasey Toth

DURHAM

A Charlotte-based real estate firm has nearly doubled its portfolio of apartment units in North Durham after dropping almost $12 million on an apartment complex off Guess Road.

Ginkgo Residential – a Charlotte firm that manages properties in North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia –purchased the Willowdaile Apartments for $11.8 million on May 11, according to a Durham County deed record.

The purchase valued the 201-unit apartment complex at $58,700 per unit.

The 32-year-old apartment complex at 3835 Guess Road, fits the mold for a typical Gingko purchase. The company focuses primarily on purchasing reasonably-priced “middle market” housing in the Southeast.

Digital Access for only $0.99

Middle-market rental units are defined as those that rent between the 40th percentile and 80th percentile of area median rent, according to a study from the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University.

The median rent in Durham is $1,130 per month for a two-bedroom apartment, according to real estate company Trulia.

Willowdaile Apartments offers one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments as well as a swimming pool and laundry facility. Apartment rents range from one bedroom units for $670 to three-bedroom units for $910 per month.

Ginkgo also owns the nearby Croasdaile Apartments on Front Street, which it purchased in 2016 for $23 million, or approximately $84,500 per unit, according to a county record.

Units at the Croasdaile property, which was built in 1969, range in cost from $800 per month for a one-bedroom unit to $1,160 for a two-bedroom unit.

The acquisition of the Willowdaile Apartments now gives Ginkgo 473 apartment units in the Bull City.

“Ginkgo Residential is excited to expand our presence in the Durham market,” Ginkgo CEO Philip Payne said in a statement.

“With the addition of Willowdaile Apartments, Ginkgo now has 473 units in close proximity to Duke University and downtown Durham. Willowdaile is also an excellent fit with Ginkgo’s focus on workforce housing.”

Built in 1985, the Willowdaile Apartments sit on a more than 16-acre property. House Company LLC had owned the properties since 2004, when it bought the complex for $6 million.

The apartments have a property value of $9.3 million as of 2016, according to county records.

Ginkgo owns several apartment properties in the Triangle area. It also owns the Boundary Village Townhomes in Cary and West Oak Apartment Homes in Wake Forest. It also manages property for Washington Terrace in Raleigh.

Read Next

At internment camps where China forces up to 1 million ethnic minority Muslims to give up their language and religion, detainees are sewing sportswear that can end up on US university campuses and sports teams.